Clementine Rose - from the author of Alice-Miranda

A gorgeous new series for girls from the bestselling author of the Alice-Miranda series.

Clementine Rose was delivered not in the usual way, at a hospital, but in the back of a mini-van, in a basket of dinner rolls.

So begins the story of a lovely little girl who lives in Penberthy Floss in a large ramshackle house with her mother, Lady Clarissa, Digby Pertwhistle the butler and a very sweet teacup pig called Lavender.

When her scary Aunt Violet arrives unexpectedly, the household is thrown into disarray. What is it that Aunt Violet really wants and what is she carrying in her mysterious black bag?

From the author of the best-selling Alice-Miranda series, for readers aged 5+.

Interview with Ambelin Kwaymullina

Ambelin Kwaymullina’s debut novel The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf is a fresh new entry into the Young Adult genre. Kwaymullina deftly creates a dystopian world where society is divided between the Citizens, the ordinary but oppressed population, and the Illegals, runaways who possess strange powers. The author’s first venture into fiction tells the story of Ashala, the leader of an Illegal tribe captured by the Citizens and held in a Detention Centre for interrogation. The survival of her beloved Tribe hangs in the balance, and Ambelin Kwaymullina tells Ashala’s story with such ease that it was impossible to put down.
- Review by Willem Proos, 14, from our Teen Book Club

Ambelin will be at Shearer's on Wednesday July 25th at 4.30pm. To give you a little taste of what she might talk about, here's an interview we did with her.

Why did you choose to write a young adult novel rather than an adult or children's novel?

Let’s face it, teenagers are way more interesting than adults (no, just kidding – sort of). Really, I wrote the story that was there to be told. It was Ashala’s story, and she is sixteen so that made it a young adult novel. I didn’t see much point in writing a novel about a teenager for adults, because we all know that teenagers are very mysterious and adults will never understand them. Except for me of course, but I feel like a teenager on the inside. It’s very disconcerting to have people around you expect that you’ll act all confident and mature when I feel about 18 most of the time.  When I was writing Ashala I felt sixteen, because I was writing from her perspective and sharing her thoughts and emotions. Because of that I think teenagers will understand Ashala just that little bit better than adults do. And I think they’ll know, too, what it’s like to challenge the world the way she does.

What were your main inspirations for writing The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf?

My brother Blaze originally thought of the title to the book. Blaze is very good at thinking up titles and names. But he didn’t have a story. So for a few years there was this great title hanging about. All my family write books, and sometimes we’d have conversations about what a fantastic title Blaze had thought up, but it didn’t go any further than that. Then, one day, Ashala’s story started coming into my head. The first line of the book has been the same from the very beginning – ‘He was taking me to the machine’. When I wrote those words, I didn’t know what the machine was, or who ‘he’ was, or where Ashala was. But that was alright, because I knew I had a story. I figured I’d find out eventually, and I did, as Ashala and the other characters in the book revealed their world to me.

Did you base any of your characters on anyone you know?

Not consciously. But on re-reading the book recently I think there’s a lot of myself in Ashala. She shares my fear of spiders, for a start, although she has far less of a phobia than I do. And she’s probably about as stubborn as I am, or maybe even a little more, and I think we both have a bit of a slightly off-the-wall sense of humour. There’s a few occasions in the book when Ash makes jokes in serious situations and nobody laughs – yeah, I can relate to that. Also, anyone who reads the book and knows my family immediately identifies Jaz with my younger brother Blaze.

Have you always wanted to be an author?

Oh yes! I have always, ALWAYS wanted to write a novel. I’ve done picture books before, but writing a novel has been my goal for a very long time. I’ve been writing various novels anytime for the past twenty years, although I never finished most of them. I am the proud owner of a box of unfinished books, and I don’t think any of them are very good. The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf is the one that worked and I think the reason for that is Ashala herself. She is so strong, and I heard her voice so clearly, that I had to write a good story to do justice to her, and all the rest of the Tribe.

I still can’t quite believe I’ve actually done it. I catch sight of the book in a bookstore with my name on it and think – wow. That’s me. That’s my book, right there on the shelf with all those other books. How cool is that?

Unfortunately I don’t think writing a novel has actually made me any cooler than I was before. I still tend to trip over my feet and make jokes that no one laughs at. I’m also the person who walks up to the automatic doors and they don’t open for me even though they’ve opened for dozens of people ahead of me (those doors see me coming, I swear). But you never know. Give me a few years and few more books and I might just be a little bit cool – or at least be able to get the doors to open...  

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr Morris Lessmore

Just a quick heads up for anyone who loves watching animated films on the internet. The Fantastic Books of Mr Morris Lessmore is not only an awesomely illustrated picture book but it's also an Academy Award-winning short film - and as everyone knows, that means it's got to be pretty good! 

The story of this book and movie was inspired by a kind of crazy mixture of The Wizard of Oz, Hurricane Katrina - which almost destroyed New Orleans in 2005 - and Buster Keaton, the comedian whose nickname was "The Great Stone Face". All of this is mixed in with a man who really loves books. 

Buster Keaton - "The Great Stone Face"

Click here to see a funny clip of Buster Keaton's greatest moments (you might recognise the first one).

The Fantastic Books of Mr Morris Lessmore was created using a hybrid style of animation, which combines miniatures, computer animation and 2D animation, which makes it really amazing to watch. Great for anyone interested in animation, or for anyone who just loves seeing an interesting movie with fun characters on a rainy holiday afternoon!

Check this 15 minute movie out below:

Or else click through here to watch it on youtube. 

Click here to watch the tornado scene in The Wizard of Oz.

The sun was shining on Leichhardt one glorious day in May when the handsome prince of picture books, Oliver Jeffers, joined us for a drawing extravaganza in the Town Hall. He was greeted by 250 smiling, and very excitable fans all armed and ready for Oliver to put a secret scribble in the front of their books.

He treated us to a very funny trip down Jeffers memory lane with lots of photos and drawings of people and places that have inspired him. He then went on to do a live action drawing session of three of his magnificent books...from beginning to end. There were lots of laughs and after watching the Bafta award winning film of his book, 'Lost and Found', everyone went home to read about the boy who ate books, the other boy and his friend the penguin, the cool new jumper and someone with a heart in her bottle.

A big thank you to Harper Collins for bringing him along and also to Leichhardt Library for helping organise the event.
For those who missed out, don’t despair... we have lots of signed copies of Oliver’s books available.


(Last photo by Penny Ryan photography. Thank you Penny!!)

Video Interview: Eoin Colfer!

I had a quick chat to Eoin Colfer as he was in Sydney for the Sydney Writers’ Festival.  He was having afternoon tea near the harbour with the water glistening in the background.  I couldn’t help thinking about how we live in a magical city.

Eoin trained as a teacher, and when he showed his son the first ten pages of Artemis Fowl his son’s response was “You didn’t write this”!

The idea for Artemis came from a photo of his brother, at the age of 7, dressed in a suit and making a very funny face. Eoin knows kids loves technology and he wanted to bring technology to his fairy story and so the first Artemis Fowl book was born.
The 8th and final Artemis Fowl book will be published in on July 10th this year. This final chapter of the exciting and well-loved Artemis Fowl series is called The Last Guardian, and is eagerly awaited.  It’s often a sad moment when a favourite character’s journey comes to an end, but Eoin realised the Artemis story was finished and didn’t want to betray the beginning of the story.

Eoin, who lives in his native country of Ireland, said a big thank you to all his Australian readers “from the bottom of my green heart”.

Chris Morphew Interview

 If you can't wait until the May release of 'Fallout', the next instalment in the painfully exciting Phoenix Files series... here is a little interview we did with Chris to see you through....

1. Congratulations on the series going international. I was just looking at the UK fan website and they seem to be loving the series. Great covers too! What is it like to be an international superstar?
It’s pretty surreal to think of all the places where my books are starting to appear. But honestly, life for me continues pretty much as normal. I still get up and go to school three days a week. I still sit down with my iPad every day and bash out the next page of the next book. I still drive to church every weekend in my second-hand car. But every now and then I’ll get an email from someone halfway around the world and I’ll remember just how incredible it is that I get to do this job!

2. When did you discover you were a writer?
I guess I’ve just been writing ever since I learned how. I’ve got stories all the way back to age five or six, mostly featuring dinosaurs and/or spaceships. Actually getting published always seemed like a bit of an impossible dream, but writing for the fun of it is something I’ve loved pretty much forever.

3. The Phoenix Files is quite an ambitious series not only in its length but it is jam packed with action and loaded with an assortment of twists and turns. Are you a planner when it comes to writing or do you just go with the flow?
I’m definitely a planner. So much of The Phoenix Files is about mystery and the unknown that I’d feel like I was ripping the reader off if I didn’t have a pretty solid idea of where it was all going.
Before I even started on the first draft of the first book, I sat down and came up with a pretty detailed outline of the whole series. Some details of the plot have changed a bit in the writing, but as I sit down to write the
final book in the series, it’s quite gratifying to realise how much things have gone according to plan.

4. Some of your fans have said how frustrating it is that you always leave things on a spectacular cliffhanger, leaving them desperate for the next book. Are you going to be able to wrap everything up in the last book or are we all going to be cursing you for the rest of our lives?
I’m going to do my absolute best to wrap up all of the major threads of the story. Part of this means not leaving everything hanging until the last book. Fallout, the second-last book in the series, has just gone to print, and it answers a few of the really big questions that have been hanging over the series since the beginning.
But of course, I’ve still left myself with plenty to do in the final book.
The one thing I’ve never had to do in The Phoenix Files is write an ending. As you say, so far it’s been cliffhanger after cliffhanger, so this is a new challenge for me – but it’s one I’ve really been enjoying, and I hope you’ll all be satisfied with the results!

5. Do you think working as a teacher and being constantly surrounded by kids has helped you tap into what the kids want to read?
The kids I teach are mainly in years K-2, so there’s actually very little overlap between my teaching and my writing. So if I’ve succeeded in tapping into the teenage mind, I think that’s probably got more to do with the part of me that’s still very teenagerish.
I never sit down and think to myself, “What would kids think is fun to read?” because I think that’s a sure-fire way to end up sounding really lame and artificial. Instead, I ask myself, “What would I think is fun to
read?” and I just go ahead and write that.

6. Have you modelled any of the characters on yourself or people you know?
I think all the characters have a little bit of me in them. Luke’s got my tendency to worry too much. Jordan’s got my strong-mindedness and fierce sense of right and wrong. And I’d say Peter’s a pretty solid metaphor for the darkness that I think all of us have inside of us.
I try to avoid modelling characters directly on people I know. Given the dangerous world of Phoenix, I think that could be a fast-track to getting myself into trouble!

7. Jordan is my favourite character. So nice to see a strong, adventurous female as a major player in the storyline. It is still rare to find such a fun, feisty female. Why do you think the boys seem to still have all the fun?
I think other people are probably better equipped than I am to answer the question of why boys get so much more attention, but the lack of strong female characters in kids’ and YA fiction was certainly on my mind as I was coming up with Jordan. I work part-time at a Sydney girls’ school, and I really wanted to create a hero for them – someone who wasn’t a superhero, but who was intelligent and courageous and morally-centred. She’s my favourite character too!

8. How close do you get to your characters? Is it like a nine to five job where you can shut off at the end of the day or do they haunt you long into the night?
I can get pretty emotionally invested in the characters while I’m actually writing, but once the iPad is put away for the day, I’m usually pretty good at leaving them behind. I have heaps of fun writing the characters I’ve created, but I’m not one of those authors who imagines secret lives for them that bleed off the page.

9. You are over half way through the series. Can you imagine not living with these characters?
It’s pretty surreal to think that, by this time next year, the series will be finished. That said, I’ve known all along that it was going to be six book and out, so I’ve had a while to brace myself. I think there’ll be a real sense of accomplishment that comes with wrapping the series up, but I can imagine there’ll also be a bit of a withdrawal period when it’s all done and dusted.

10. We are all massive Chris Morphew fans at Shearer's because not only do we all love The Phoenix Files, but also you are always great with talking to the kids. You are on Facebook, Twitter, you have a blog where you talk to the kids... Do you think it is important to be so accessible?
That's my favourite part of the job! To me, the whole point of writing issharing ideas with people – and Facebook, Twitter, blogging, writers' festivals, etc. are all just extensions of that conversation.
On top of that, I'm more than happy to do what little I can to break down our culture's weird obsession with fame. Not that I'm claiming to have any sort of actual "celebrity" status, but to whatever extent people are tempted to view me as a Special Famous Person, I like to do what I can to talk them out of it.

11. Where did you get that amazing yellow jacket that appears in a lot of press release photos?
Ha! That jacket was a present from my sister. She’d been travelling through south-east Asia for several weeks, and I got a Facebook message saying, “Send me your measurements. I’ve got a surprise.” Two weeks later, she came home with The Suit.

12. Is yellow your favourite colour because I have also seen that magnificent yellow car that you drive?
No, that’s just a happy coincidence – although it does make figuring out where I parked a whole lot easier!

13. What are you reading at the moment?
I’ve just finished Michael Grant’s two newest titles: Fear and BZRK, which were both as dark and gross and gripping as you might expect if you’ve read any of the Gone series. I’ve also just this week finished reading the whole Bible through, cover to cover, which has been fascinating.
As always, I’ve got a huge stack of books waiting to be read. Top of the pile at the moment is the complete Lord of the Rings, which I am determined to actually finish this time.

14. As a writer and a reader, does the eBook phenomenon excite you or bore you?
I really don’t think about it too much. Personally, I’d much rather hold a physical book in my hands than read a novel from a screen, but that’s mostly just personal preference. As long as people keep reading books in one form or another – which I’m sure they will – the format they choose really doesn’t bother me.

Don't forget to check out Chris' awesome blog to find out more about books, writing and American Cereal Parties!

Leichhardt Public School's 150th Birthday

In 1862, the world was awash with beginnings and change.  The first railway New Zealand ever saw was opened, Abraham Lincoln gave his State of the Union address to end slavery and Archer won the Melbourne Cup.  John Young was the Governor of New South Wales and it was also the year that the famous French inventor Auguste Lumiere (whose invention spurred the start of the film industry) was born.  Oh what a year!  And of course, it doesn’t end there, as 1862 was the year that Leichhardt Public School first opened its doors.

To celebrate the sesquicentenary (what a terrific word), Leichhardt Public School is compiling a souvenir history book for all its students, past and present.  To do this, they are calling on everyone to donate or lend any photos and other memorabilia so that it can be archived.  Already the school has found their oldest living past pupil in John Dugdale, aged 96, who has been emailing photos and stories of his school days.


If you are a past student, print out the pdf form here and send it to the school.  They will keep you up to date with any events planned for 2012, including the Back to Leichhardt Day being held on 9 September and the Sesqui Ball on 11 May.

Congratulations Leichhardt Public School and Happy Birthday!